Finding More:
Better Creative Balance
For some time I've been uncertain whether writing about my photography – as I do extensively on this website – somehow invalidates my quest to be a ‘proper’ photographer. Should I be letting the image do all the talking? Should I be more single-minded, and concentrate on the visual medium? But now that Rachel has enabled me to think more widely, I've been happy to put this quest aside. Instead, I can use my energies to follow any/all opportunities for creative expression – with all the benefits to my wellbeing that Rachel alludes to, and the parliamentarians discuss in detail. Precise labels cease to matter. And all my different approaches to creativity are valid, in all their different ways.
Adel Churchyard
Seeking that 'still small voice of calm'
This means that my new, wider interpretation encourages me to value my blogs as much as my fine art images; they have the same creative-currency as my research projects for university assignments, with their 2000-word essays; and my collages; and as this review of Rachel’s course and the impact it’s having; and as a photo-mapping project; and as my current photography-project, entitled ‘Spring Beyond the Ring Road’, in which I’m creating postcard-sized images of the places we’re re‑visiting after months of shielding and lockdown, and sticking them on the wardrobe door!
And all the disparate, eclectic sources of inspiration also have equal parity amongst themselves; Rachel’s abstract series ‘Between Seeing and Knowing’ informs and inspires me, as does the installation ‘She’ by Paul Jex; as do our visits to galleries and exhibitions; and dissimilar genre and artists – from landscape to abstract – from Ansel Adams to Uta Barth; and the snippets of knowledge which I acquire as Ian's webmaster; and from seeing artists on Facebook; meeting writers and poets on Twitter. And the books on my reading list have equal currency too – books on photography, art, drawing, philosophy, bird-therapy, ways of seeing, typography, landmarks, the hidden life of trees, urban development, tulipomania, local history, the happiness trap and more.
I can now enjoy whichever creative project engages my interest on the day and do it freely, and confidently; do it knowing that (along with the enjoyment and pleasure, along with being interested and feeling interesting) my physical and mental wellbeing is also improving daily; and knowing that I’m continuing to build on the firm foundations laid down on the earlier wellbeing-course with Ruth Davey.
Breathing
It also means I can stop asking myself, where do I want my photography to go, what do I want it to do? – the kind of question I might have asked myself almost 50 years ago as a young adult at the start of my career, or maybe the one a grandma asks a child, what do you want to be when you grow up? Instead, Rachel has enabled me to pose a better question – a more helpful, more healthy, more productive one – what do I want to express, share, create, explore today, what feels most exciting, interesting, challenging, the most fun?
Some days it might be ‘proper’ photography (and I might create an image which I can exhibit); some days I might create a collage about my mum and the objects we’ve kept after she died (or one imagining her yarn-bombing a cruise missile on Greenham Common); or a collage addressing the persistent problem which women encounter of being defined by their relationship to men (or by their age, their colour, appearance, weight etc); or explore the potential of ICM photography; or write about my love of trees and churches; start a local research project on the reason why our suburb is so green and leafy; reimagine the paintings of local artist John Atkinson Grimshaw in my own style; create a photographic map of medieval churches in York. I might even pick up my crocheting again – along with all the associated memories of my Nan who taught me!
Some projects might help me understand myself better; some might make better sense of the world around me; some might just be for simple child-like fun and curiosity. It really doesn’t matter what I choose to create or why I choose to do it. All that matters is that I do, that I embrace it.
Our Matthew often says, “you over-think things, Ma”. Well, maybe I’ll stop doing it now.
With Rachel’s guidance and inspiration, I've found far, far more than just my focus.
I've found a healthy creative balance.
And this feels a wonderful point to have reached in my life.